Bank of Russia official dismisses rumours of upsurge in counterfeiting

October 12, 2013, 3:09 UTC+3A senior Bank of Russia official has dismissed the rumours of an upsurge in counterfeiting

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Photo ITAR-TASS/ Aleksandr Kolbasov

MOSCOW, October 12 (Itar-Tass) - A senior Bank of Russia official has dismissed the rumours of an upsurge in counterfeiting, but at the same time agreed that ways of circulating forgeries were changing.

“The situation looks calm by and large,” the CBR cash circulation department’s director, Alexander Yurov, told the media on Friday, when asked about problems with depositing 5,000-rouble notes through ATMs. “The number of exposed forgeries has been steady on the decline over the past three years. For instance, in January-September 2013 the number of Bank of Russia notes identified as fakes was 20 percent less than in the same period last year. The concentration of fakes in our country was 15 per one million genuine notes in circulation in 2012, which is roughly half of the EU countries’ rate.”

At the same time there developed two new trends of late - an increase in the share of faked 5,000 rouble notes (43 percent of all identified forgeries) and the emergence of forgeries meant in particular for depositing through ATMs and payment terminals. As for faked 5,000 rouble notes, their share has increased somewhat, while the overall amount of forgeries has declined. The aggregate amount of exposed fakes has remained practically the same - 22,500 in January-September this year in contrast to 21,000 in the same period last year, Yurov said.